HP calls for improved management of e-waste in Africa

The problem is especially acute in Africa, where extreme poverty motivates people to take apart electronic goods, regardless of health and environmental repercussions, in search of valuable metals or pieces, such as copper coil, which can be sold for up to US$5 per kilogram in countries such as South Africa.

Often the methods of destroying the electronic equipment to extract certain parts involve burning or other unsafe measures, which produce toxic effects on the environment and human health.

Hewlett Packard (HP), in collaboration with the Global Digital Solidarity Fund (DSF), and the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research (Empa), has launched a groundbreaking initiative to develop sustainable recycling processes to tackle the problem of e-waste in Africa.

"This project was borne out of what we saw: a need for greater amount of infrastructure to deal with end of life electronics," Kirstie McIntyre, environmental compliance manager at HP EMEA, told MediaGlobal.

For the past two years, the initiative has been overseeing a pilot program facility in South Africa and conducting e-waste management assessment studies in both Kenya and Morocco; the goal of the assessments is ultimately to properly determine each country's ability to deal with the e-waste there, whether it arose from electronics that were purchased new within the country and are now reaching their end of life, or from electronics that were shipped illegally from other countries.

The project has been examining efforts by both African governments and organisations to safely handle e-waste.

"What we wanted to do was start to create some baseline data around what is actually happening with waste electronics in countries in Africa and what could be done to make the treatment of waste electronics better from an environment and from a social perspective for the people involved working in those areas," McIntyre said.

The project has been compiling extensive information, such as the policy and legal framework in each country, standard settings for e-waste treatment, organisations and programs already in place to safely process e-waste, and the actual amounts of e-waste present.

"What we found was some similarities and some differences between those countries. In many of the countries, there's a lot of informal recycling going on. That's a good thing because it provides work for people who wouldn't normally have work," explained McIntyre. "It's a lucrative job, but what we're concerned about is whether it's being done at a cost to the environment and at a health cost and a social cost to the people involved in it," she added.

The initiative has also been working with local organisations to gain a better understanding of each country and how it regards e-waste. Empa and DSF have been providing HP with their expertise and experience to communicate with local organisations and policy-makers.

Based on the findings of the e-waste management assessments in Kenya and Morocco, the initiative has been making recommendations in those countries for specific policies and standards that would help mitigate e-waste. In addition to improving the standards and infrastructure for effective e-waste management, the HP initiative seeks to provide employment opportunities by expanding the informal e-waste recycling sector. The work of the HP initiative is particularly important and relevant as there have been an increasing number of consumers buying electronics in recent years.

Additionally, since electronics have become more affordable, there has been a sharp rise in the sale of products to African countries, which in turn has spawned a rise in the amount of e-waste. Illegal shipments of waste electronics from Europe have also been exacerbating the problem, as large deliveries have been appearing in countries with major ports such as Kenya and Nigeria.

While the first phase of this project involved gathering information and offering recommendations, the second phase has sought to actively engage corporations and governments to establish comprehensive programs to tackle e-waste in other African countries. Ideally, the project aims to teach people in the selected countries what is required to effectively treat e-waste.

"We don't necessarily want to have our hand in every endeavor. We want to start people off on the right track and let them continue down that track on their own," asserted McIntyre. "I think that really our objective is to show that you can still work with what we call the informal sector in African countries to enable them to treat and recycle their e-waste in an environmentally and socially responsible manner. I suppose that is our main objective, to demonstrate that point," she added.

HP plans to extend their project and assessment studies elsewhere, particularly in West Africa and the Middle East.

Article published courtesy of MediaGlobal